Budget is often a deciding factor in when it comes to how you market your business. Due to budget restraints, some clients opt for just one strategy over another, not necessarily thinking of how one strategy can impact the other and the overall ROI.
Take SEO and PPC, for example. PPC brings immediate traffic to a website while we work to build up the organic search presence for that site. With SEO comes the added benefit of optimized content on the site. Not only is the SEO content we create optimized to get the website to rank organically, it’s also optimized to help convert users from site visitors to potential customers. This helps not only the search visitors but all visitors who come to the site through other channels as well. This makes PPC & SEO the perfect match, as both strategies are designed to generate leads.
The following examples demonstrate how clients that enlist us for both the PPC and SEO see stronger PPC conversion rates:
We have a Decorating Den client who initially came on for PPC only. She later added SEO to her marketing mix. When we compare PPC data over a 4-month period in 2016 to the same period in 2017, we see a notable increase in conversion rate. The CTR and costs were similar year over year; however, the conversion rate for just PPC form leads increased by 128.13%.
Still not convinced? Let’s look at another example:
Enter two Decorating Den Interiors Franchisees; both are women who are the only decorators in their respective franchises; they use the standard corporate-provided photos throughout their sites; they share a similar PPC budget; and they use exactly the same keywords and ad copy in their PPC campaigns.
The only notable differences? Franchisee A utilizes SEO and PPC, whereas Franchisee B only utilizes PPC. The businesses are also located in slightly different geographic regions.
Below we compared AdWords and Analytics data from June 2017 to September 2017. We also only compared PPC form conversions, no phone calls or organic form leads were taken into account.
Decorating Den Interiors – Franchisee A
Decorating Den Interiors – Franchisee B
As you can see, although the other metrics are similar, the business that leverages both SEO & PPC had a much stronger conversion rate.
Why could this be? It’s all about the content. As part of the SEO strategy, we build out a ton of content on the site.
- Relevant content. We build pages for every type of product and service, so when a user is searching for “custom window treatments,” we send them to a page about window treatments. Many clients who only do PPC do not have specific landing pages for each product and service.
- Local content. The optimized content is localized in such a way that it creates a trust factor. Simply stating on your site that you serve local neighborhoods can go a long way in converting users.
- Quantity of content. With more pages on the site, users can browse the different pages and get to know the business more. The fuller site establishes credibility for the business, giving the sense that the business is more established.
So, while PPC brings quality visitors to a site, the PPC campaign does not convert as well without optimized and quality content on the site.
In a world where businesses are competing for visibility, SEO has an initial handicap since it takes some time to gain organic traction; however, it’s interesting to see that when we focus on PPC metrics, businesses that leverage SEO see better PPC conversion rates.